


Regret

by Altum_Videtur



Series: Ni kar'tayl gai sa'ad [3]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-22
Updated: 2020-01-22
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:21:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22359397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Altum_Videtur/pseuds/Altum_Videtur
Summary: In the aftermath of the Battle of Ryloth, Ahsoka comes to terms with being responsible for other people's lives. Set right after Storm Over Ryloth.
Relationships: Ahsoka Tano & Original Clone Trooper Character(s), Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano, CT-7567 | Rex & Ahsoka Tano
Series: Ni kar'tayl gai sa'ad [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1604194
Comments: 5
Kudos: 79





	Regret

The battle had gone very well, all things considered. Sure, they’d lost both the _Redeemer_ and the _Defender—_ as well as most of Blue Squadron in her disastrous first attack on the blockade—but they’d evacuated the _Defender,_ allowed Obi-Wan to land on Ryloth, and casualties had been very light after Anakin had so effectively taken down the droid control ship. All told, her first command of a cruiser had gone as well as her first command of a squadron had gone poorly. Still, as soon as she had the chance, she’d cornered Anakin as he was finishing his tour of the medbay, dragged him into an out of the way corridor, and—

“What in all the Sith Hells were you _thinking,_ Master? Putting me in charge of the _Resolute,_ no backup, no _plan,_ I could have gotten everyone killed! I could have gotten _you_ killed!”

Anakin held his hands up in front of him to cut off her tirade. “Whoa, whoa, everything worked out, didn’t it? Snips, you need to have more faith in yourself.”

“Faith in myself? I just got _Blue Squadron_ killed! This isn’t some kind of training mission!”

“Ahsoka, why do you think—” Anakin paused and stepped closer to Ahsoka to let a clone trooper rush past them, glanced around to see if they were being overheard, and lowered his voice a little. “Why do you think I didn’t want to take you on as a padawan?”

While Ahsoka knew he had certainly warmed up to her, she still felt a bit hurt whenever she thought about how dismissive he’d been when she’d first been sent to him, and she didn’t appreciate the reminder. “Oh I don’t know, Master, maybe because I’m reckless, and impulsive, and would _just slow you down.”_

Anakin winced. “I really said that, didn’t I?”

“Yup!”

“If I ever say something that stupid again, you have permission to shoot me.” He paused. “Non-lethally.”

Well, at least he’d admitted how insensitive he’d been. Sort of.

"Jedi aren’t meant to fight wars, Snips.”

“ ‘Keepers of the peace, not soldiers’, I know, Master. I’ve only heard that _five thousand times._ Forgive me, Master, but you’re the last person I expected to hear that platitude from.”

“It’s not a platitude, it’s...” Anakin paused, and then just… Kept pausing. Ahsoka wasn’t sure she’d seen him struggle this much to find words before. That said, he’d never discussed more than basic philosophy with her. This was uncharted territory for them.

I was sixteen the first time someone died due to my mistakes,” Anakin eventually said, “because when I was your age Obi-Wan would never put me in that position.” Again, Anakin paused. “Flipping the _Resolute_ like that, to keep the bridge and hangers safe? That was _brilliant_. Even with my destruction of the control ship. Facing overwhelming odds, needing to win decisively enough to protect my escape pod, and only losing seventeen men? _Brilliant!”_

“Okay now you’re just buttering me up.” Ahsoka said. “I sense a ‘but’ coming on, Master.”

“The price of war is that we look at the death of seventeen innocent people who were born and bred to die and never given a _choice,_ and we call it a _good day._ Before I was a Jedi,” he said, “I was a slave. I became a Jedi to free slaves. Imagine my surprise to find myself in command of a legion of them.”

⁂

“Hey, Sparx!”

“Commander Tano!” The ARC Trooper gave her a wide grin. “What can I do for you, sir?”

Ahsoka found her expression shifting into something less that happy. “Are…” She looked around. Rex and Fives were sitting at the other end of the mess hall, and looked deep in conversation. Strider was one table down from Rex, with three other clones she didn’t recognize. Maybe a dozen people in the hall in total. Likely no one would overhear as long as she kept her voice down, which was probably the best she was going to get without making a spectacle out of asking to talk to him alone. “Can I ask you something, Sparx?”

Sparx’s grin didn’t waver. It was surprisingly contagious. Ahsoka found a smile warring with her face despite her grim mood. “General Skywalker said something, the other day. Did you… Did any of you get a choice, to be here?”

“It’s a bit more complicated than that, sir.” That was about the most ominous thing he could have possibly said, how did the man say that cheerfully? He was still _grinning._

“Complicated.” She repeated.

“The way I see it, sir, I can either fight for the Republic, or against it. I’m not betraying my brothers, sir. Not for my life. _Vod’e an.”_ He was still grinning, but it seemed a less cheerful, now. More bloodthirsty.

“ _Vod’e an?”_

“It’s Mando’a, sir. Means ‘brothers, all’. Well, siblings, really, Mando’a is a gender neutral language, but most of the clones are men, sir, and if you say ‘siblings’ in Basic all the time people look at you like you’re trying to start a cult, so. Brothers.”

“Thank you.” Ahsoka said. She hesitated for a moment, afraid of being too presumptuous. “ _Vod’e.”_ She said.

Sparx laughed. “ ‘ _Vod’_ would be the singular, sir.”

And then the grief that she had so carefully tucked away since Ryloth hit, because _Blue Squadron_ wasn’t some vague concept of clone soldiers anymore, it was brothers, brothers who were never given a choice to fight in this war and who fought anyway, and were never given a choice about being under her command and who had died anyway, and brothers who had never even seemed to _consider_ holding her responsible for their deaths even though she _was_ and—

When she finally stopped sobbing, she realized that at some point she’d become enveloped by half a dozen clones. She slowly released the tight grip she’d had on Sparx and Fives, and looked up. The brothers around her made her feel absolved, and a little bit _squished._ The look in Rex’s eyes as they met hers wasn’t absolution, exactly.

 _I’ve lost so many of my brothers to my own mistakes,_ he didn’t say. _How can I forgive you for something I can’t forgive myself for_ he didn’t say. “ _Vod’e an.”_ He said. _You are also my brother._

**Author's Note:**

> I rewrote Anakin's price of war speech so many times because it kept feeling like the first work except with Ahsoka instead of Padmé, and I really don't know what happened with Sparx. He was supposed to be a one-off character, and he's frustrating to write because I keep wanting to spell his name with a 'k'. Don't really know what happened with Rex, either. That really wasn't what I planned on him doing, he just kinda wrote himself.


End file.
